Roll the CD decrease for Dagger Storm taken with trickster into Dagger Storm (72 Seconds). Don't balance based on "this skill is used so it is prob OP." Think about why they're used.

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

This has been said before, but adding it for parity. 

 

Stop making the class needlessly more difficult if you're going to ship things like catalyst and expect thief to interact with them. Daggerstorm and Withdraw are picked because they are useful and the competing skills are not, not because they are overpowered innately. They do not deserve to be excluded from the CD reductions given to the other tricks. 

 

If you want people to use -other- skills, make those skills also useful instead of making the useful skills less useful.

 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Jobber.6348]

1 hour ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

not because they are overpowered innately

There's debate to be had here. 

 

Withdraw is a 4k base heal (5k in competitive) with movement impairment removal and evade baked in at 18s CD (25 competitive). That's a little loaded in my book. You should be having a giggle that Anet isn't even looking at it with the nerf bat considering there are things nerfed for being less loaded. But the only reason Anet probably won't reduce its cooldown is to adhere to their "Heal nerf" balance declaration back then where they decided sustain was a little too darn high in competitive so everyone got slapped. 

Daggerstorm probably could use the CD reduction. It Evades and Reflects but it's only for 3s and does jack for damage and is used to usually facilitate escapes. 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Yasai.3549

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

17 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

There's debate to be had here. 

 

Withdraw is a 4k base heal (5k in competitive) with movement impairment removal and evade baked in at 18s CD (25 competitive). That's a little loaded in my book. You should be having a giggle that Anet isn't even looking at it with the nerf bat considering there are things nerfed for being less loaded. But the only reason Anet probably won't reduce its cooldown is to adhere to their "Heal nerf" balance declaration back then where they decided sustain was a little too darn high in competitive so everyone got slapped. 

Daggerstorm probably could use the CD reduction. It Evades and Reflects but it's only for 3s and does jack for damage and is used to usually facilitate escapes. 

 

I don't have anything constructive to say  regarding withdraw being considered loaded at 25 seconds. 

 

I'm not surprised though. 

[Jobber.6348]

3 minutes ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

 

I don't have anything constructive to say  regarding withdraw being considered loaded at 25 seconds. 

 

I'm not surprised though. 

The skill is kinda loaded utility wise, but the 25s thing is probably Anet's balance philosophy. Personally I'd like it to be a nice and sweet 20s. Don't see it happening tho. 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Yasai.3549

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

21 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

The skill is kinda loaded utility wise, but the 25s thing is probably Anet's balance philosophy. Personally I'd like it to be a nice and sweet 20s. Don't see it happening tho. 

The balance philosophy means nothing if adhering to it causes a class to become disproprtionately inflexible for the role it is intended to fill.

Nobody is going to use Skelk venom, malice signet, mercy or channeled vigor for obvious reasons pertaining to how little damage it takes to kill a thief against the effort needed to get decent healing for any of them.

Itll be Hide in Shadows and that's it. You don't even see withdraw being used right now. This only punishes the handful of thieves insistent on playing melee.

I won't entertain the idea that it's loaded. We will have to agree to disagree.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Jobber.6348]

14 minutes ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

Nobody is going to use Skelk venom, malice signet, mercy or channeled vigor for obvious reasons pertaining to how little damage it takes to kill a thief against the effort needed to get decent healing for any of them.

Itll be Hide in Shadows and that's it. You don't even see withdraw being used right now.

I won't entertain the idea that it's loaded.

Okay functionally speaking, it is loaded. It does 3 active effects for the price of 1 button press. Let's compare some other core healing skills in the same CD range, 1 from each class with as much "load" on the same level as Withdraw: 

 

Shelter for example. Boi's Heeal with 2s block with a hefty 30s CD. 2 active effects.

 

To The Limit! Heal and gain Adrenaline and Endurance, 30s CD. 3 active effects~ cos idk if you can consider refilling resources as an active effect.

 

Soothing Stone: Heal + Condi Cleanse + Resolution gain, 30s CD. 3 active effects~ and again, not sure if Resolution gain is an active effect but let's say it is. 

 

Elixir H: Heal + Boons. 25s CD. 2 active effects. 

 

 

Troll Ungent: HoT. 1 active effect. 25s. Only listed because it's the only one with the same CD range. 

Only one I would consider on the same level of Withdraw is To The Limit because it heals for easily 2x the amount of every other healing skill here while providing additional benefits. Withdraw is considered "a little" to me because it performs 3 actions (2 and a half if we discount the condition removal) and actually a little more because it isn't only just an evade, it's an evade with movement tied to it, which makes it more mechanically valuable in combat. 

At least this is how I consider a skill's "loadedness" and Withdraw is functionally loaded. 

 

 

14 minutes ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

You don't even see withdraw being used right now.

Eh really? I've seen a few Thieves in WvW use it, usually in conjunction with Roll for Ini to give themselves around 1000 units of retreat while fully evaded. 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Yasai.3549

[Azure The Heartless.3261]

35 minutes ago, Yasai.3549 said:

Okay functionally speaking, it is loaded. It does 3 active effects for the price of 1 button press. Let's compare some other core healing skills in the same CD range, 1 from each class with as much "load" on the same level as Withdraw: 

 

Shelter for example. Boi's Heeal with 2s block with a hefty 30s CD. 2 active effects.

 

To The Limit! Heal and gain Adrenaline and Endurance, 30s CD. 3 active effects~ cos idk if you can consider refilling resources as an active effect.

 

Soothing Stone: Heal + Condi Cleanse + Resolution gain, 30s CD. 3 active effects~ and again, not sure if Resolution gain is an active effect but let's say it is. 

 

Elixir H: Heal + Boons. 25s CD. 2 active effects. 

 

Troll Ungent: HoT. 1 active effect. 25s. Only listed because it's the only one with the same CD range. 

Only one I would consider on the same level of Withdraw is To The Limit because it heals for easily 2x the amount of every other healing skill here while providing additional benefits. Withdraw is considered "a little" to me because it performs 3 actions (2 and a half if we discount the condition removal) and actually a little more because it isn't only just an evade, it's an evade with movement tied to it, which makes it more mechanically valuable in combat. 

At least this is how I consider a skill's "loadedness" and Withdraw is functionally loaded. 

 

Eh really? I've seen a few Thieves in WvW use it, usually in conjunction with Roll for Ini to give themselves around 1000 units of retreat while fully evaded. 

 

None of that matters. 

 

Thief is functionally different for the classes listed above. It doesn't have potential for high levels of staying power, nor does it have high levels of damage to finish fights quickly on its own.  The skills you listed above have been balanced based on what they provide to the classes listed, and how they help them fulfill their class roles. The skills often come coupled with additional mitigative skills to help bridge the gap while the heal (or heals, in the case of revenant) is/are on cooldown. Thief has very limited access to skills of that type.

Just because the classes mentioned above have those cds does not mean others should be changed for parity, especially if they have not led to problematic builds. Balancing or forming opinions based on how many 'things' a skill does, without consideration of the needs of that class is also an issue.

  If you keep balancing in directions that keep all the skill uptimes nice and neat without adjusting the functionality of the professions that have need of that uptime (or, in this case, making it worse), you will balance classes out of the game. 

I'm sure eventually there will be a balance patch that adjusts the cd of Withdraw and Dagger storm. I'm just trying to save Anet some time and thieves a couple of months of headache/profession shelving. 

 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Azure The Heartless.3261

[Jobber.6348]

2 hours ago, Azure The Heartless.3261 said:

 

None of that matters. 

 

Thief is functionally different for the classes listed above. It doesn't have potential for high levels of staying power, nor does it have high levels of damage to finish fights quickly on its own.  The skills you listed above have been balanced based on what they provide to the classes listed, and how they help them fulfill their class roles. The skills often come coupled with additional mitigative skills to help bridge the gap while the heal (or heals, in the case of revenant) is/are on cooldown. Thief has very limited access to skills of that type.

Just because the classes mentioned above have those cds does not mean others should be changed for parity, especially if they have not led to problematic builds. Balancing or forming opinions based on how many 'things' a skill does, without consideration of the needs of that class is also an issue.

  If you keep balancing in directions that keep all the skill uptimes nice and neat without adjusting the functionality of the professions that have need of that uptime (or, in this case, making it worse), you will balance classes out of the game. 

I'm sure eventually there will be a balance patch that adjusts the cd of Withdraw and Dagger storm. I'm just trying to save Anet some time and thieves a couple of months of headache/profession shelving. 

 

You're right, but then again, every class plays differently from each other, along with the defensive capabilities some enjoy and some do not. There are so many variables like trait healing or access to dodges, stealth too. But healing skills aren't all that different from other classes. You press a button, you incur a cooldown cost, you gain its effects. That's somewhat the same between classes. Okay maybe not the same for Revenant who has to also pay a tiny Energy cost.

Withdraw is definitely still an option right now, and maybe Anet will reduce its cooldown, or maybe wants to buff something else.

 

 

[Chips.7968]

4 hours ago, Yasai.3549 said:

You're right, but then again, every class plays differently from each other, along with the defensive capabilities some enjoy and some do not. There are so many variables like trait healing or access to dodges, stealth too. But healing skills aren't all that different from other classes. You press a button, you incur a cooldown cost, you gain its effects. That's somewhat the same between classes. Okay maybe not the same for Revenant who has to also pay a tiny Energy cost.

Withdraw is definitely still an option right now, and maybe Anet will reduce its cooldown, or maybe wants to buff something else.

 

 

Take away the evade element and I'd be very surprised if it's chosen at all.

 

So is it *really* "loaded", or is it just *one* factor of if that's indispensable to some builds? 

 

Now before you answer, this thread's about dagger storm specifically; why are we talking about withdraw. E.g. same cooldown as, i'm sure you'll agree, the absolutely "overloaded" Renewed Focus, while being far far worse 😄 

The one thing I'd be amazed people don't agree upon is that "balancing" is a questionable term in this game. 

Edited February 11, 2023 by Chips.7968

[Jugglemonkey.8741]

Withdraw is basically on every build i use bar specter, mostly because it evades and is "instant cast" (i put that in quotes because i have definitely been stunned after using withdraw and roll for ini before when i should have been evading, but that's probably a desynch issue more than anything). Most other thief heals are not as useable on core thief in competitive modes because the 1s+ cast time makes the skill a liability, thieves usually can't hang around that long while being shot at. The evade is also very useful in thief vs thief fights as most thieves will time steal for the end of animations to ensure they land it, using withdraw after a dodge cuts the aftercast on the dodge roll slightly and that difference in timing can be used to bait good opponents into wasting their steal. Makes less difference against specter and deadeye, but is massively important against core and daredevil.

Cleansing root on core thief is also an issue these days (especially if you don't have acro), you pretty much have withdraw, roll for ini, shadowstep, cleansing sigil, then you die lol. I get that immob was meant to be the counter to evade thief and that is fine, but i also don't think core thief was designed to deal with the amount of immob druid and soulbeast can throw out these days, they can easily draw out all the skills i listed and have immob to spare. I admittedly don't use trickster as it's in competition with bountiful theft, but core S/D usually has only withdraw and mug for sustain so i get why that extra 5s matters to the OP. 

[Bunny.9834]

I lost hope for this balance team. 

🪦⚰️